


Poise

by Lilliterra



Category: Twin Peaks
Genre: Canon Compliant, Gen, Missing Scene, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-10
Updated: 2020-02-10
Packaged: 2021-02-27 23:27:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 758
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22644082
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lilliterra/pseuds/Lilliterra
Summary: "It is always… interesting… to see the good fall from grace."I was just mad that they didn't show the part at Dead Dog Farm where Jean Renault punches Cooper in the face.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 11





	Poise

Dale stepped carefully toward the house at Dead Dog farm, hands in the air.

Surely this would work. The carpet of leaves and dry grass crunched underfoot with a sensation that would ordinarily be delightful, but at the moment seemed only to add to the suspense.

Dennis – as Dennis – and Ernie Nialls watched him intently, as did Jean Renault, standing behind them at the door. They’d seen him put down the gun, and yet— one wrong move, and they could be dead.

“Slow,” called Renault as he approached.

Cooper slowed.

“Turn around.”

“I want to see you let them go.”

With a dramatic empty-handed flourish Renault released Ernie. The Mountie dropped agent Bryson and gave him a shove.

As soon as the hostages were free, their pistols were immediately trained on him. For all intents and purposes, the exchange was complete.

“Turn around! Hands behind your back.” Cooper did as he was told; able to watch Ernie run back to the police car as fast as his legs could carry him. Bryson also walked away, shaken, but not without a backwards glance and a brief eye contact with Cooper. Cooper gave him a nod, hoping to convey that it was okay.

Maybe someone else would have questioned why he was exchanging himself for these men. He’d always known Bryson as a colleague and as a good man. He had no special relationship to Ernie, but he’d spent all morning assuring him that nothing would go wrong, which did lend him a certain sense of responsibility. But, if he was being honest, he had to admit that he probably would have done the same for any innocent person of Twin Peaks.

And in this case, it was incumbent on him because he knew that Renault was after him personally. The thought gave him a twinge of apprehension, but the man had _accepted it_ and that was the important part.

It was the Mountie who grabbed his wrists, holding one arm and twisting the other, hard, until he gave an involuntary gasp, then pulled him in through the door. The ancient screen door of the farmhouse snapped shut with a bang and rattle.

He didn’t fight or speak as the Canadian officer tied his forearms tightly together in front of his body with a (perhaps excessive) length of rope. “You are not going anywhere.”

He didn’t reply. There was no reason to.

Renault had moved to the back of the kitchen. He leaned casually against the peeling wallpaper, adjusting the sleeve of his suit jacket as though he was king behind the desk at One-eyed Jack’s, instead of keeping a hostage in a rotting farmhouse surrounded by police.

“So,” he said flatly, in his lazy French drawl. “We have him at last. Special Agent Dale Cooper.” He smiled slightly. “I had plan… to have them arrest you for drug trafficking. It is always… interesting… to see the _good_ fall from grace. They rely so heavily on their… reputation.” He had paused occasionally to find the right words, but his genteel manner was unmarred. However, his beady eyes focused on Cooper with a tight scrutiny. “When the good lose the reputation… what do they have? Are they really so _good_ after all?”

Cooper just stared.

“Bring him here. I want to look at him.”

The Mountie pushed him around the table until he was standing directly in front of Renault, jostling him a little more than strictly necessary.

“Cooper, Cooper, Special Agent Cooper. Everybody loves Cooper. He is perfect. He is professional. He is cheerful, with that _bright, innocent, righteous_ face.”

Renault looked at the wall, adjusted his cuff link a little more with a placid expression. Then in an instant his face contorted into a mask of rage and pain. Cooper barely had the chance to even see it before Renault’s fist slammed into his cheekbone. He stumbled back into the table, thrown by the man’s full weight.

He struggled to regain his balance, at first too stunned to feel pain, (it was as though all the thoughts had been knocked out of his head) but finally noticing that his cheek had been sliced on Renault’s ring and there was a trickle of blood running down his face.

When he looked up again, Jean Renault was again leaning against the wall, cold and detached, the image of poise. He flicked his wrist, shaking out the impact. “You cannot imagine how… I have needed this. The drug plan may have failed, but… I have you myself, and that is even better.”


End file.
